SALESFUEL TODAY

Apparel and Beauty Marketers Winning Millennials Through Social Media

Millennials are more likely than other age groups to friend brands and companies on social media. The unique way they share their likes and preferences through various social networks is having an impact on both online and in-store sales. The latest research from the Center for Marketing Research at University of Massachusetts Dartmouth reveals which marketers can benefit from this consumer behavior.

Millennials range in age from 13 to 33. While older Millennials are often in a different life stage than the youngest people in this group, researchers have been able to draw conclusions about preferences and the implications for marketers.

Millennials follow brands and companies on specific platforms as follows:

Facebook 62%

Twitter 23%

Pinterest 11%

Top Facebook brands for this group are Nike, Target and Forever 21. Nike also ranks in the top 5 on Twitter.

While Millennials say the top motivation for friending or liking a brand is to show support, there’s also big interest in getting coupons or discounts and in showing their preferences to their friends. At least 30% of Millennials, across all three of these social networks, also said they liked a brand in response to a prompt from an ad they saw on TV or in print.

About 47% of Millennials make a brand purchase after creating a pin on Pinterest. For Twitter, the comparable number was 33% and for Facebook, it was 38%. The top product category for purchases was hair and beauty/apparel. Over 45% of Millennials at all 3 of the social sites made such purchases. The food and drink category on Twitter came in at 21% while tech and electronics products were the second most popular purchase types at Facebook with a rating of 18%.

Millennials may be connected digitally but they still like to shop in the traditional store environment. Pinterest users have the highest rate of online only shopping at 23%, while Facebook users have the highest rate of multi-channel shopping at 77%. The highest rate of in-store shopping goes to Twitter users at 16%.

The UMass researchers also note that Millennials overall are “making more social influenced purchases than their older counterparts.” Brands should know that engaging Millennials on these platforms taps into the desire to share interests with friends and family so the effects of any marketing campaign on social media is quickly amplified.

To learn more about Millennials, check out the Audience Interests & Intent Report available at the Research Store on ad-ology.com.

Kathy is the Vice President of Research for SalesFuel. She holds a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Vermont and oversees a staff of researchers, writers and content providers for SalesFuel. Previously, she was co-owner of several small businesses in the health care services sector.